STRANGE WISH OF A POET

New Zealand Times, Volume LIII, Issue 12609, 20 November 1926, Page 11

STRANGE WISH OF A POET

Wants to Die by Shell From a Big Gun

To die at the end of a twelveinch gun is said to be the latest extraordinary wish of Gabrielle D’Annunzio, Italy’s, most distinguished poet, playwright, and great lover.

'FTiK problem of an exit from the * stage of life so magnificent and sensational as to he worthy of himself, has worried D’Annunzio on and off fur many years. Tlie. death tliat most people hope ior, a, peaceful one in bed, is to. Ins way of thinking the worst of all. So D’Annunzio’s truly remarkable and inventive mind considered and rejected hundreds of ways* to ring down the curtain on himself in such a way as to produce the greatest volume of astonishment. These deaths ranged from smoking a cigar loaded with dynamite to jumping down the crater of a volcano. The volcano idea was abandoned with regret —because it had been done before ECLIPSED I The latest suggestion of the 12ii» gun is said to. have come accidentally from a friend with whom D’Annunzio was mournfully discussing, the fact that Mussolini had completely eclipsed him in the public eye. The poet lmd shut himself up mysteriously in his villa, posted his soldiers, bought fierce dogs, hired deaf mutes to serve him, and commanded the world to keep away and forget him. A few years before this would have brought all Europe clamouring at liis ■ gates; but now nobody came, not even Ida Rubenstein, the beautiful actress and dancer who has tbe distinction of being the only woman who had strength of mind enough to “put one over” on .the groat lover. When D’Annunzio told her to go away, she took him at his word and never came back. He had then publicly confessed to the world all his dalliances and dramatically begged his wife, whom he •had deserted twenty-five years before, to forgive him. Here were the makings of a stunning sensation, but Madame D’Annunzio merely' answered: “All right.” And the rest of the world said, “What of it?” “Nobody has ever had the honour of

having a 12-inch shell fired at him, alone, deliberately,” says the poet, “no single man lias ever been deemed worth such an expense, nor even of a 6-inch or a. 5.”

The date set for D’Annunzio’s departure will depend largely on the outcome of an experiment in rejuvenation.

A doctor named Orlandini is D’Annunzio’s house guest in tho Lake of Garda villa during the present period of his withdrawal from tho world. Tho Roman scientist, officiating as doctor and cook, is subjecting his famous patient to the diet which, it is hoped, will take twenty-five years from his age. When the day comes for the superb exit it is expected that there will he a worthy audience, including his wife and Ida Rubinstein, if ho can get them, and as many other women who have been in his life as his magic call will bring together. Some, like Eleanora Duse, who died of a broken heart, can only be there in spirit. The gun is to be fixed on part of a cruiser, a trophy of the Great War, which lies in the poet-lover’s grounds. D’Annunzio, however, cannot aim the gun at himself nor get anyone else to fire, but by merely sighting through the breach, he can determine where the shell will strike and have his men mark that spot with a buoy. To get himself hit. it is only necessary to stand in a boat lashed to that buoy.

A last item in the programme calling for no great ingenuity is an electric timing mechanism for firing the gun.